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TraxWeekly Issue 092
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founded march 12, 1995 _| : _____ t r a x w e e k l y # 92
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| TraxWeekly Issue #92 | Release date: 20 Mar 1997 | Subscribers: 932 |
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/-[Introduction]------------------------------------------------------------
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Dear readers,
Welcome to TraxWeekly #92. Over the last few weeks, I've been thinking
really hard about whether or not I should continue running this newsletter.
Thankfully, I have just finished another quarter and finals at university,
and free time is around again. First off, I want to thank all twenty or
so of you who volunteered to take this task off my hands. I really
appreciate the fact that you would be willing to take on a job that pays
nothing and can end up being a chore instead of a hobby.
In any case, we have an excellent set of responses to Bibby's excellent
"Thoughts on Tracked CD's and Cassettes" article from Issue #89. Also
included this week is the ModSquad and their coverage on music theory, and
a short piece on Sound Club, a music writing program I think some of you
will be interested in.
Please welcome the group Aim Higher back to the music scene! Wow,
someone still remembers Epinicion...sniff...brings a tear to my eye. =)
Have a great day, and enjoy the issue!
Gene Wie (Psibelius)
TraxWeekly Publishing
gwie@csusm.edu
/-[Contents]----------------------------------------------------------------
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/ ____/_/ __/ \ __/ / _____/ \ __/ __/ ___/_
< \____\ \ \\ \ \\____ __/ __/_\ \ \\____ \_____ \__
\ \ \ \\ \ \ww\ \\ \\ \ \ \ \ \_
_\________\________\\___\____\ \_____\\_______\\___\____\ \_____\_______\
Letters and Feedback
1. Eric Bell
2. Anonymous
3. Doc
4. Lachlan Barclay
General Articles
5. Music Theory: A Modern Approach....................The Modsquad
6. The Story of Sound Club............................Terminus
Group Articles
7. AIM Higher
8. DiSC
Closing
Distribution
Subscription/Contribution Information
TraxWeekly Staff Sheet
/-[Letters and Feedback]----------------------------------------------------
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--[1. Letter from Eric Bell]------------------------------------------------
From howling.dog@sympatico.caFri Mar 14 22:29:04 1997
Date: Fri, 14 Mar 1997 10:06:17
From: Eric Bell <howling.dog@sympatico.ca>
To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu
Subject: Tracked CDs / Todds Modds
A couple notes from the MOD Philes:
I really enjoyed Bibby's article on tracked music migrating into the
netherworld of non-computer playback via CDs and cassettes. I'd like to
cover this aspect of the scene in the MOD Philes in Music & Computers.
Would anyone who has a CD or cassette drop me an email?
Thanks!
In case you missed them, here some of Todd Rundgren's fave trax:
"This was culled from titles I left in my PlayerPro playlist. Also, you'll
note that there's nothing with a title beyond 'H'- boy, it takes a long
time to get through all those files! Also, I could find no info in some
of my favorites- not even a title sometimes.
Good luck
TR
Bangin' Cindy
by: paal granum
Banana Split
Alternative Samba
by: juha kujanpaa
Boesendorfer
Romeo Knight
Ambient Break
by: timm albers
batacuda!
by: dj blackbird
Do Ya Trust Me?
by: andrew barnabas
Here's Johnny
by: Doctor J"
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--[2. Letter from Anonymous]------------------------------------------------
From anonymous@anonymous.orgFri Mar 14 22:29:10 1997
Date: Fri, 14 Mar 1997 16:21:37 +0100
From: anonymous@anonymous.org
Ode To ELWOOD
You came and rocked the scene
Like nothing we had ever seen
Your music pure
Uncatchable
And bright
Turns stones on fire
Makes darkness go light
But before we could ask,
who ...
what ...
where ...
You'd left like you were never there
This, somehow I see
Is sadly how it should be
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--[3. Letter from Doc]------------------------------------------------------
From adi_s@netvision.net.ilFri Mar 14 22:28:09 1997
Date: Thu, 13 Mar 1997 14:47:43 +0200
From: Doc <adi_s@netvision.net.il>
To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu, bibby@juno.com
Subject: Selling out Tracks - Comments.
Hi.
First of all, I'm DOC, i'm 22 and i've been tracking for about 5 years.
I would like to say and bright some things about the article called
"Some Words on Tracked CD's and Cassettes" which came with the 89th
edition of Traxweek. I've been thinking too, how to sell my work to
the public, ofcourse, i'm talking about the Non-Tracking people.
The main idea is NOT to relate this music as "Came out from a PC",
people who read this and doesn't know what its all about, Automatically
think its an Electronic/VideoGames/Chip music, and as far as i can tell,
that's a wrong impression. Take me for example, I create various music
styles, Its not hard to tell that the higher percent of the tracking
-music, is Techno/Rave/Dance, BUT, that's not what i do. One can create
so many styles using trackers, I for example, make Classical/Jazz/
Alternative Rock/ and mixture of all styles.
To another style i create, i call "SoundTrack" style. That's exactly the
type of music you hear at the movies. So, another way to make money, it
not just trying to sell your music to the public, but also selling your
tracks as a TV-Series music for example.
Anyway, to hear samples of my music, go to my site:
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Heights/3693
Signed,
Doc.
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--[4. Letter from Lachlan Barclay]------------------------------------------
From s943011@mhs.schnet.edu.auSun Mar 16 17:49:39 1997
Date: Mon, 17 Mar 1997 10:53:03 +1000
From: lachlan <s943011@mhs.schnet.edu.au>
To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu
Subject: Tracking Music, Traxweekly
To Gene Wie and everyone at TraxWeekly,
I have been an avid tracker over the past six years, and would like to
contribute my thoughts to the scene.
Most people don't know me [apart from a few selective people (Bibby,
Red Haze, Jester)], so here's a bit of a clue in;
I started tracking when I first went around to a friends and he had
an Amiga. The music just blowed me away! I had a PC with the typical PC
speaker sound, and going from that to a 4 track mod file on an excellent
stereo was just mind-blowing.
Anyway I laid my hands on a copy of ModEdit, found a few samples and
chucked together a couple of songs. The first results were pretty terrible,
but I bought myself a sound blaster and things were getting a bit better.
Two years later, I met somebody at school who had a copy of Scream
Tracker 3, and now I could use more than four channels, and better quality
sound as well. I now bought myself a Pro Audio Spectum. Strange choice for
tracking? It's basically the only sound card which has a Bass and Treble
levels built in, and once I found Impulse tracker I was flying.
However, recently I have been having a bit of a look at the very new
music files coming out, I have found a lot of BIG .XM's. Using Fast Tracker
I have found that a lot of these songs are just huge samples, with a couple
of looped drum beats. I am really against these music files as you might as
well chuck together a couple of wave files together. However, if you have
sampled all the instruments (not samples) yourself, then I can't see why
there is nothing wrong with that. The problem is here, who samples their
own stuff?
However, if you have used a tracker to play a lead sample, and used
a filter on it (Roland TB-303 or a guitar multi-effects pedal) to sample
back into your computer, then THAT would be a very good way of creating an
original sample, from an unoriginal sample. And that is the method which I
am using at the moment to create my own original sounds.
Using these very technoish prodigy sounding samples, I have recorded
some of my efforts onto tape and played them for a few friends. I've
selected a wide audience, girls, guys, teenagers to parents, and most of
them like my easily accessible dance stuff.
Recently, a couple of my friends have asked for tapes of my music to
have a listen to and play to their friends, and somebody has even offered
to play my stuff over the radio. (If you live in Melbourne, Aust, listen to
89.9FM this Thursday morning (20/3/97). So I got thinking, why the hell not
make a CD out of this?
So I designed the CD cover using POV-Ray (a great Ray-tracer) and
pieced together my best songs, and made up a few titles (Thanx Chuck
Biscuits, Great title for a song). I'm getting the CD pressed in a few
weeks, and now I'm trying to get a wider audience.
The Question is: Can you make some decent money out of this???
Where would you start to make and distrubute a tracking CD? Have
many people tried to make some money out of this? Bibby's article last week
really got me thinking, look at Prodigy, yea Gods Purple Motion's heavy
techno stuff is light years ahead of their music. Look at "Cool City" and
the famous second reality music. That is just fantastic, really popular
stuff. And as for Raves playing video's and stuff as everybody dances,
imagine gawking at Second reality on a huge projector, it would be enough
to send anybody into an epileptic fit!
Well thanks a lot for listening to my gibber, please Reply and
remember: Keep Tracking, Original and non-suppressed music rules!
Lachlan Barclay
P.S. My hard disk Crashed yesterday, so I pray to everyone, please back up
your music. You don't know how much you need it until it's gone.
Backup now!
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/-[General Articles]--------------------------------------------------------
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--[5. Music Theory: A Modern Approach]----------------------[The Modsquad]--
Music Theory: A Modern Approach
To Perfecting An Old Art, and Learning
How To Better Yourself, and What You Track.
by
Finrez, Radio Shock, Neon Hunter, and Bottlehead
modsquad@juno.com
This is a new introducer named Bottlehead. Thats me!
I have to say that this series of articles is important, considering
that Music Theory has been governed by really old people like Beethoven
(wasn't he a dog?) whos like 250 years old. I mean, in dog years thats like
20, but look at us. Most of us are like thirteen or fourteen. Its nice to
hear a fresh voice in theory isn't it? I mean, look how Elvis did.
This is the fourth article in our second theory series. We don't know how
long it will be, but with the delays in traxweekly, we've managed to write
quite far ahead, so the articles will be a little bigger than they
normally were. We expect to finish up around number 8. This one, we will
cover Elvis' Tips, Experiences Building a Vocoder, Legends of the
Firestarter, Elvis in his Youth, Lightsources, and The Stratocaster
-----[ Elvis, He Knew How it wuz DUN ]------ooOOOoo-
"Ah knew what ah was doin when ah was fifteen. You get a bass guitar,
play it without an amp, and make a fool of yourself. Thats how stars
are born, thats how I was made." - Elvis
This is what I and you personally should go by. Whenever tracking,
turn your speakers down real low, below audible ranges, and start
tracking! This was how WAVE was born, this is how YOU could be made.
.OooOo.----[ MY EXPEaRENCES BUILDING A VoCoDeR ]----oOo.
"Maybe you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away, and held for ransom!"
_HEARTBREAKER_HOTEL_
--Aphid Twix
You could not believe the joy I experienced when I recieved my Vocoder
kit in the mail. I had waited weeks for this package after making that
special call to Paia, the magic Vocoder company that I had heard so much
about. Now I had the legendary Paia vocoder in my hot little hands.
Ignoring my mothers indignant questions about how "all you got for the
$600 I spent are these little plastic parts?" I set about to build it.
Assembly. For the most part it was easy. The manual was fairly well
written, although some pages were out of order. More than once I did
things like putting a bolt in place before realizing that a grounding
strap had to be attached underneath it.
The parts, well.. really only a few op-amps and a transistor was missing,
but of the screws and bolts of the kit, there never seemed to be enough.
It would be a good idea to keep a supply of nuts and bolts just to be
sure.
This was an 8 band vocoder. Basically this means that each of the inputs
are split up into 8 bands, going from bass to treble. Like so:
So this way the inputs are split
,--[8 ohm]---| |--, into 8 sine waves each. Then
input 1 band 1 ---< >-- each band is multiplied together
`--[1 ohm]--/\/\--' using transistors. Finally, the
resulting 8 waves are mixed
,--[7 ohm]---| |--, together to form the vocoded
input 1 band 2 ---< >-- sound. In general, the more
`--[2 ohm]--/\/\/-' bands a Vocoder has, the better
it sounds, but a fewer number
/\/\/ = coil [x ohm] = resistor of bands produce a gritty sound
| | = capacitor that some prefer over the smoother
sound of an 8 band 'Coder, much
like some people prefer the gritty sound of the distorted guitar over the
smooth sound of the Hammond B3.
After two weeks of soldering, I finally got up the courage to turn the damn
thing on. Running a sound through it would seem a simple task, but I'll
tell you: I couldn't find a microphone anywhere! I finally had to run down
to Radio Shack and buy a cheap mic to use. Then I couldn't find my
headphones! I found a tinny set to use just for a test, but they were
broken.
Finally I got my good pair and plugged them in. I plugged my Casio
Tone Bank into it and punched up the organ patch. Plugged the mic in.
I held a note and spoke into the mic: "Watson come here, I need you!"
The sweet, sweet sound that flowed out of that mono jack was the most
beautiful sound I have ever heard in my life. Knowing that I could
put this rad sound into my tracks sent a chill through my spine.
The Paia Vocoder: the best buy I have ever made.
And my mother likes it too.
---------[ LEGENDS OF THE FIRESTARTER ]--------
"Hello?? Hello??"
---Inspekdah Deck
I finally found out about all of this firestarter mumbojumbo...
one day, i was walking down the street, when part of my upper-right
arm caught on fire for no apparent reason.. luckily, no one was around
to cause emberassment... becuase i tell you, if anyone saw ME combust,
i would freak. but anyway, i had a coke can in my backpack and i opened
it and put out the flames after having a few sips.. man.. theres no more
hair THERE anymore..
after going to the doctor, and explaining what an in-convience this
problem was, he told me what disease i had.. he said, "man, you've
probably been infected with the streptocumbustious disease.."
so now you know, about this quickly spready, near-deadly disease!
it is highly contagious!! .. so becarefull...
or you yourself, may become a "true firestarter"...
-------o-----------[ ELViS iN HiS YuTH ]--------.~-.-~--------
"Heya girl, do that them thing with those there legs again"
--Elvis in his Youth
Contrary to popular belief, Elvis was not born with a silver foot in his
mouth. In fact, he didn't even make it into the choral group cause he
couldn't sing well enough. I told ya before, its all in his hips. His
hips were a big secret for a while, he never showed them to anyone til
he was famous.
These are the most important things to remember about Elvis:
1. He was showt az da shee
2. He was killed by fan bladez
3. He is dead
4. So are the damn saints
It could be that he was only short as the shit after death because of the
fan blades but that is debatable cause he didn't die instantly so he was
short as the shit before his death for a little while at least IMHO.
-----[ STRATOCASTER ]---------
"Every day is like a dirty road!"
--Sheryl Crow
My uncle used to play the guitar in high school. He was pretty good
at it, too, until he took his first whiff of crack, then his main thought
in life was "Lookit the birdies, wee!" and then he would urinate on
himself.
He had some wonderful sayings when before he fell prey to the clutches
of crack-cocaine. One of his (and my) favorites was: "Buy yourself one
stompbox every payday." He made quite a collection for himself until
he switched over to "Buy yourself 20 grams every payday, and food if
theres money left over."
You see, he had a job at a ball point pen manufacturing facility. He
would insert the little nozzle of ink into the tube that the ink went
into and remove it when it was finished. This took about five seconds,
and after that he had about 25 seconds free (but he had to be careful,
because that ink went everywhere and didn't come off if he missed).
So these 25 seconds, he used to jot down little ditties that he would
later play on his guitar, and imagine about what the new stompboxes
would do for him. He got a new stompbox about every two weeks.
It was sheer beauty to see him play, his fingers a blur on the strings,
his solos, his feet switching effects left and right, getting just that
right kind of distortion, and harmonizing with himself with a delay that
was set to be two beats later than the original note. He could almost
play in tune with a ring modulator, and his wah-wah effects came second
to none.
But no band ever offered him a position. They looked at him and listened
to him play, and they said "Well he's good now, but what'll happen after
he gets his first whiff of crack-cocaine and urinates on himself?" And
dammit, they were right. I remember one of those bands, Toe Knee Times
Three or a similar name, they were amazingly rude to him.
They said "Man, you play good except you're probably gonna get hooked on
crack-cocaine and piss all over yourself and die soon, so fuck you." I
hear they went on to be very successful.
Wouldn't you know it? One day he came home from work covered with ink,
all depressed. His foreman had given him a little vial of stuff that
looked like rock candy but wasn't. He looked at it and sighed, and
stripped off all his clothes to wash off, then lit the stuff right in
the vial, bare ass naked.
He told me about it later. "I was just gonna take this toke see? And
then I would see what all the hype was about? And that would be it,
see? I would never do it again. But then I took the smoke into my lungs,
held it there for thirty seconds, and let it out. It was the most amazing
euphoria you can imagine, right?" He sat there for thirty minutes on his
bare ink covered ass, immediately addicted to The Rock.
It all went downhill from there. At first he only bought a stompbox every
other payday, then he stopped buying them at all. And THEN, he started
to sell them to buy his drug. First the phaser went. Then his ring
modulator, then the reverb, the two delays, the chorus/flanger, the
compressor, and finally his prized box, the distortion. He was fired
soon afterwards.
He was down to playing raw, but he really wasn't much of a player anymore.
All he could get right was the simplest tunes. Finally he sold his amp
and played with a pair of headphones. Then he sold his headphones and
played with nothing.
He wouldn't sell his Stratocaster though. I hear it would've netted him
over $10,000, enough for a trip to the Betty Ford Clinic, but neither he
nor I knew about this until it was far too late. He went wandering one
night with it slung over his shoulder like a sack of beans, and he got
mugged by some hopeful punk rockers who wanted to form a band. I hear
they got a good start in a local club, Soul Kitchen, and went on to be
pretty successful. I think their name was The Aquabats.
Anyways, after that, uncle Eddie (that was his name) just lay there and
cried. He broke into Soul Kitchen one night and saw his beloved
Stratocaster onstage. He was so mad, he jumped right up there and ripped
it away from the player. But he accidentally went too close to a stack,
and the feedback made him deaf.
To this day, he wanders the streets of Soho, in the rain, looking for
Chinese resteraunts, mumbling about beef chow mein and urinating on
himself repeatedly.
---------[ INSPIRATION OUTDOORS ]-----------
"Sometimes, I really needed inspiration. My wife was very nice about
this, and she came up with the perfect solution. She came up to me and
rubbed up against me and said: 'No sex until you write a new song!'
Then I would quickly get a new song done, believe you me!"
--Stan Miller
To get inspiration to write tunes, I often have to go outside. If you
go outside you can see lots of cool stuff. For example, I once went
outside and saw a squirrel. You know, those squirrels are pretty cute.
I went inside and wrote a song about the squirrel I saw.
One time I went outside and looked in someones window and watched Dr.
Quinn Medecine Woman through the window until it ended. And then I went
and tracked a song about Dr. Quinn Medecine Ball.
Another time I went outside it was raining hailstones and I went inside
and tracked a hardcore gabber tune.
A different time, I went outside and saw a few kids playing street hockey
and riding around on bikes. I watched as the younger generation acted out
their future roles in society in amazement and wonder. Then I tracked a
tune about how they would all grow up to be professional hockey players and
wrestlers and doctors. One of them was a girl so it might even be a future
Dr. Quinn Medecine Ball but I didn't ask her name, it might not have even
been Quinn.
One time I went outside and skateboarded around for a while until some guys
drove by in a car and yelled at me "hay you punk" and then I went home and
found them there in my driveway and they took my ram chips and I cried all
night because I couldn't track.
When I was going to get more ram chips some kids kicked me in the balls and
stole all my money but I grabbed one of their guns and went and shot the
clerk and stole a bunch of ram chips so I could track. It was the best song
I ever tracked in my life.
------------[ LIGHT SOURCES ]---------------
"I was thinking about thise whole light source coding thing, and then I
thought 'What would happen if we just had no light source at all, and
we couldnt see shit!' Thats how our group won at Assumblo '96."
--Crevice/Suture Crew
I was thinking about that ancient Chinese art that was rearranging your
house so it would help you in life. It was called Roomagami or something
like that, I forget. Anyways, I was thinking about how it might apply to
tracking because I was in a rut tracking wise at the time.
After a bit of thinking, I decided that it would be best to rearrange my
own home. I found that most of the rearranging was all in the lights and
shadows! So if you move the light source in the room you can change your
whole lifestyle!
I found after trial and error that the further away your light source is,
the better you track. I should have known; when the light goes on when you
get it perfect, its dimmed by the light nearby and you keep trying and
just feel like shit!
But the problem was, with the light source so far away I couldn't track
because I couldnt see the keyboard! I had to deal with this problem.
After thinking a while, I decided to put a lampshade on the light, so I
could see the keyboard and still see the light as it went on. After I
found a shade and moved my light source back to where it was, and I
tracked better than I ever had in my life!
So theres the solution: put a lampshade on your light and just leave it
where it is and your tracking will improve dramatically!
------------------------------------
That was the fourth installment of our second music theory series of
articles. If you want to contact us, our email address is at the top
and bottom of the file.
Love,
Finrez,
Radio Shock,
Neon Hunter,
and Bottlehead
modsquad@juno.com
(c) 1997 FuNkY MoDSQuaD iNC
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--[6. The Story of Sound Club]----------------------------------[Terminus]--
This is the story of a music program most of you probably haven't heard
of, but which has had a great influence on the people who use it. I
started my way into computer music with Sound Club, and I still use it
quite a lot, although I've shifted to FT2 for most part :).
But let's not rush ahead. Things started in 1994 or something, when I was
round at my friend's place and he had a cool 286 =). I had heard something
about computer music and I used to listen to the mods on my 286 and
pcspeaker with the old ModPlay which - yup - only played 4chnl mods :).
There weren't too much others round, well, not round my place anyway. I was
desperately looking for a program to write music with, I had found some
kind of modedit but it didn't work and so I flushed it. I asked him to show
me some kind of music program he had, and he showed me SC. It was an early
pirated betaversion, it would only let you edit one pattern, and all the
patterndata + samples + all other info had to fit into the conventional
memory which was left over from the program - some 400k. But there were
limitations and so the length of a pattern was something like 3 minutes for
me (a 3-minute pattern??? wtf??? more on this below =).
And I was like, no kidding, you can actually WRITE MUSIC on this thing..
and I started to write quite a lot. I have all my old pieces, and it is
sometimes quite nice to listen to what I have written. I never EVER trash
my own stuff, I have atleast 2 copies of everything backed onto my tape
just in case :).
Well, what's so special about SC anyway?
The thing is that it takes a completely different approach to
computer-based music, unlike anything I've seen - well, not really. SC
looks pretty much like a MIDI sequencer, i.e. patterns run from LEFT to
RIGHT, horizontally, not vertically as in most (all?) trackers. Note's
pitch is represented by its relative height in the grid... ah, to make
things more clear, let's take an example. Let's say you have something like
this in a tracker:
00 | C-3 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | A-3 01 40 000 |
01 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
02 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
03 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
04 | C-3 01 40 000 | F-3 01 40 000 | A-3 01 40 000 |
05 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
06 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
07 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
08 | C-3 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | G-3 01 40 000 |
09 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
0A | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
0B | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
0C | B-2 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | G#3 01 40 000 |
0D | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
0E | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
0F | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 |
(btw the progression is quite good... invented by a friend of mine :)
(Well yeah... I never was an ASCII artist...)
In SC, the whole thing looks somewhat different:
c-1|| | | | ||
b- || | | | ||
a# || | | | ||
a- ||xxxx|xxxx| | ||
g# || | | |xxxx||
g- || | |xxxx| ||
f# || | | | ||
f- || |xxxx| | ||
e- ||xxxx| |xxxx|xxxx||
d# || | | | ||
d- || | | | ||
c# || | | | ||
c- ||xxxx|xxxx|xxxx| ||
B- || | | |xxxx||
Different picture - same music. If you look at it. Each 'x', each SC 'tick'
corresponds to one row.
This way you can actually SEE your music, to visualize it, as opposed to
trackers, where you can see your progressions in time, but not in pitch -
you can't tell from a pattern what key it is in without reading all the
notes - but in SC, you can just see what notes aren't used and that's it
:).
Now, even if you can imagine this sort of thing, several questions come
into your mind, probably, like...
"Where the heck is the volume column?"
Aha. Gotcha. SoundClub is heavily window-based. (OUCH! What the heck was
that for? I didn't say _WINDOWS_-based! I said WINDOW based. Which, of
course, is a different thing. ;-) So the one I drew before is called the
notes window. This is where you actually enter the music. Another is
called volume window. Guess what's there. Besides, there are tempo and
balance windows. And then there's lyrics window. :-)
All the windows are aligned in time, i.e. the 'marker' runs from left to
right in all windows syncronously. You can't have, say, it positioned in
one place in the notes window and in another in the volume window.
So, to set the volume of an instrument, you would open the volume window,
find the volume bar of that certain instrument and drag it up and down with
your mouse until you find a certain position that suits you. Or you could
do a slide or whatever. The same with balance.
"Where, then, is the effect column, or 'window', or section?"
This is actually one of the weak points of SC - it does not support many
module effects. :-( It naturally supports things that deal with
volume/balance, it also supports portas up to some extinct (to enter them,
you would switch to special portamento mode in the notes window and connect
the end of the previous note with the beginning of the next one). Of
course, general commands like tempo and patternloops/jumps are supported.
...Anyway, let's move on. Now to the structural representation of a song in
SC.
In a tracker, you have rows, and you have patterns of rows which are mostly
of fixed length (well, can be altered in some trackers, but generally it is
still the 40h/80h rows that is used). In SC, it is different. The smallest
unit in a song is a TICK, which is like a row in tracker, but vertically.
So in the screenshot that I had before ;), a vertical row, for example, the
first three 'x'es would be a tick. Ticks are organized into BEATS. A beat
usually consists of 4 ticks. So the first 4 vertical 'x'es, the first 12,
would be a beat. Beats are separated from each other by a thin line because
it would be quite painful to your eyes to track individual ticks, which are
just no more than a few pixels on a standard 640x480 VGA screen. Beats,
again, are organized into MEASURES, which, again, usually consist of 4
beats. The whole 16 rows/ticks up there would be one measure, and measures
are separated from each other by a thicker line - again, to improve
visibility.
A standard tracker pattern (64/40h rows) would then be 4 measures with 4
beats each of 4 ticks in SC. 4x4x4=64, as you may already have figured out.
However, the great thing is that it is not carved in stone that all has to
be this way. Wanna write a waltz type of thing? No problem, just change the
number of ticks in a beat to 3 (or 6, if you need 2 ticks/rows for a note
in actual musical representation). So now you have 4 beats in a measure,
each consisting of 3 ticks, altogether 4x3=12 ticks (rows). And there is no
difference whether your patterns consist of 1 tick or 8192 ticks, provided
memory won't start limiting things.
SC also has a different way of handling instruments. In trackers, it is no
problem to set an instrument playing on all the channels simultaneously. In
SC, there has to be only one sound of instrument playing at a certain
moment - to enter triads, you would actually have 3 copies of the same
instrument in the instrument list. They all aren't of course stored in
memory, where there is still one copy, but in the list you would have
three.
You can tell one instrument from the others easily in the grid, even if
there are 60 instruments in your song. This is based on the fact that there
is only one instrument 'active' at a certain moment. The 'bars' of that
instrument are black, whereas the bars of the other instruments are grey.
You can enter the music in 3 ways:
* simply by 'drawing' them in the grid with your mouse - that's what I do
* use the standard tracker-like ZSXDCVGBHNJM, keyboard entering method, or
* use your MIDI keyboard - for the more ambitious :).
One thing which is unlike (unfortunately) any other trackers with Sclub is
it's licensing/distribution policy. The shareware/demo versions somewhat
work, but they won't let you save your music and the DOS version won't let
you play back the whole song, but one pattern only :(. Luckily they
realized that this was a mistake and in the new version things are fixed.
So there are several versions of Sclub. Nowadays most popular is the
semi-registered version, which works pretty much like the registered one,
except that it won't let you export to any widely known formats :(, but
will only save in .SN, it's only own format. Btw, the brief features of
.SN:
* pattern length is still somewhat limited ;-) - for 1-voice pattern, 16384
ticks; for 32-voice pattern, 666 ticks
* maximum 32 voices (channels)
* maximum 30 ticks per beat/beats per measure
* max 200 patterns
* max sequence length 200
* max 64 instruments
* max 65501 bytes samplelength - 8bits only :(
* runtime (de)compression, no need for archiving cuz .SN is compressed
internally
I have the registered version, which also exports to .MOD - 4- and
8-channel. It does not do so with too much accuracy, cuz .MOD does not have
a separate volumecolumn, so many of simultaneous fx (for example, a change
in both balance and volume) are lost... it can also export to .MID (general
MIDI), which is nice for writing webpage music :) - but the registration
costs 99 DEM :( - something like US$ 70, which, ofcourse is WAY too much
for such a program unless you are totally obsessed about it (like me :)..
us$20 like they take for FastTracker would sound like a deal more fair...
Just a few weeks ago, a new version came out - for Windows 95. As I am the
registered owner, I got the upgrade for free :). The most important changes
are:
* NO channels (# of voices) limit
* unlimited polyphony, you can have 40 copies of the instrument playing or
how much you want...
* can export flawlessly to .S3M
* 16bit samples, no sizelimit (memory limitations only, but under W95, you
have virtual memory and what not...)
* can directly import .WAVs/raw data for samples (old one could also import
raw data)
* can export songs directly to .WAV - great for making audio CDs
* the new .SN2 format is not compressed and will, if everything goes OK,
made public
Even if you are not a great fan of Windows or window-based DOS programs, I
advise you to check atleast the demos out to get an idea of what computer
music might be like besides trackers... NO, I'm not the author and this is
NOT an ad... :)
Download the DOS version: http://www.dc.ee/Files/Music.Player/sclub_sw.zip
or the win95 one: http://www.dc.ee/Files/Music.Player/scwdemo.zip
You can see a screenshot from the DOS version on my webpage,
http://www.teleport.ee/~terminus/eng/sound.htm
And if you have any questions about Sclub, or would like to correspond
about tracking, music or life in general, do not hesitate to mail me :-)
Terminus / Theta
terminus@teleport.ee
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/-[Group Columns]-----------------------------------------------------------
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--[7. Aim Higher]-----------------------------------------------------------
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P R O D U C T I O N S
BACK IN THE FOLD...
AIM Higher has recently risen from the dead, and this time hopes to
be bigger and better than ever. AIM Higher was a highly successful
(locally here in Toronto anyways) and highly motivating music group that
was around from the Summer of '95 to early 1996. Due to many unfortunate
factors, a decision was made to axe the group, with several group members
going in their separate directions. However, Hypnotic Melody, Paganus and
myself have decided it wouldn't be a bad idea at all to renew the spirit
of AIM Higher in the hopes of helping some young musicians out there who
are struggling or just anybody that wants to learn.
THE PHILOSOPHY...
AIM Higher is a Toronto-based PC music group much like the former
US's group Epinicion, which anybody can join.
The group is mostly modelled after the American group, yet with
some differences. The organizers, a central group of around half a
dozen trackers, saw a pc music scene that didn't welcome or aid new
musicians as much as it should. Thus the group invites all people who
aspire to be able to compose well, regardless of their ability when they
join, or their style.
Another function of Aim Higher is to be a label for "accomplished"
trackers to throw a tune into every-now-and-then. The group feels this
is important as it is a chance for skilled trackers to show their
devotion to the pc music scene. By releasing their songs alongside
the tracks of new composers, we are hoping to provide these new composers
with something to strive for. By helping us out, the vets show that
they are willing to donate their time and talent to broadening the
scene, instead of merely competing with newbies on occasion.
JOINING...
Probably the easiest thing to do is join AIM Higher. Just write me
Master Of Darkness an email and let me know where you are and what
you'd like to do. Even if you are just curious about music and don't
necessarily wish to join, by all means email me. Anybody can join, and
(taking a bit out of the old Epinicion .nfo file :) ) it doesn't really
matter if you have any other affils at all. This group is for composing,
learning and just plain old having fun.
Because that's what it's all about, right? So email me..
CLOSING...
In closing, I'd like to apologize for the somewhat sloppy information
that I've written, I'm not good at this type of thing, but wanted to let
you the public know what is going on. Our comeback should be exclamated
with a musicdisk. Currently the release date is unknown but if you wish
to supply us with a guest tune, simply email me at the below address and
either send the song (file attach) or wait for me to reply..
Thanks for reading..
Master of Darkness (tandlar@jupiter.scs.ryerson.ca)
Aka Todd Andlar
"I'm not only the president, I'm also a client!"
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P R O D U C T # I O N S
------------------------------------- #### ----------------------
(c) AIM Higher 1997
--
| Fidonet : Todd Andlar 1:2424/1004
| Internet: Todd.Andlar@dark.tor250.org
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--[8. DiSC]-----------------------------------------------------------------
"You wanna go Pro?"
by Tol / DiSC
disc@audiophile.com
-------------------------
.oOo. .o. .oo. .oo.
: ´; :´ ;´ ;
: x : : ¨¨; ===´
: .; :¨¨ ;. ;
`¨¨¨´ `¨´ `¨¨¨¨ `¨¨¨
-------------------------
www.techno.org/disc
-------------------------
...intro...
While I'm having an hour or so left, I'll take this opportunity to write
down some words about a project called DiSC, or the DigitalScorceryClub.
This may seem like just another shameless plug for just another PC music
group, and that's exactly what it is. At least for a start.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
...let's start with the plug...
DiSC IS a PC music group concentrating it's production on Techno music in
all various forms. The group is currently consists of MING and Teapot
(musicians, founders and maintainers), InhOUsEd, PopFaktor, DJKike,
Balistic, Red-I, Euphy Scott and Noxy (musicians) and finally me, Tol
(tiny imp who runs mailing lists, post to Usenet and write silly little
articles like this one).
...just a bunch of newbie lamerzzz...
Anyway, the music-group part of DiSC isn't much more than that, just a
common tag to put on the tunes, and a bunch of distribution channels. I
guess you could call us newbies, since none of the founders, and most of
the composers haven't been in this "Scene"-thing for much more than a year.
But they (not me, I don't track a byte) instead have different musical
background than most of the sceneheads. MING partially makes a living as a
classical and musical composer, and Teapot were the songwriter of a medium
hyped synthpopband in the early 90:s, an era he isn't very proud of
nowadays. And here I put his shameful past up on display for approx. 950
readers, *Bwahahah*. And I can say, without being too boastful, that there
occationally comes out some really great tunes from'em.
So, if you're terribly interrested in us and our music, please pay a visit
at the DiSC WWW:
http://www.techno.org/disc/
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
...wasn't there something else he wanted to say?...
But, (and that's the main reason I write this) there are plans. (yipes!)
There are plans to make DiSC to something more than a group. MING and I
are currently investigating the technical qualities and possibilities of
the module format, to see how and where to introduce PCs (or Macs, Amigas,
whatevers) and trackers as a professional tool for composing music. Not to
commersialise the scene, but to open the eyes on certain pepole for the
capacity of the tools themselves.
...and boy were they impressed...
Where MING lives - Stockholm, Sweden - there are companies and schools
organising various courses. One course that is popular is called
"Computers and Music", where you learn this one thing. MIDI. But after
have made some audio CDs with high-q tracked music (with the composers
permission of course :) and donated to the various teachers, they
immediatley came rushing, and wanted to know more. How to make those
songs, where to obtain the programs, and some even asked where to buy
the equipment! You should had seen their faces when MING told them that
they probably had all the equipment he'd used right in their office. Except
a CD-ROM writer perhaps.
Anyway, what DiSC in the future will provide, if enough interrest is shown,
is a website where actual job opportunitys for trax-composers will be
announced. Thre are already some interrested potentional customers here in
the roaster, and maybe even a few more, multimedia looking for music and
personally designed players - both free and implemented, even small TV and
teatre productions wants that and courseleaders looking for educational
material.
...HEEEELLLP!...
But, we need your help on this. First of all, we need to know if there are
anyone interrested in doing those jobs, someone who doesn't carry secret
dreams of a future as a famous rock'n'roll star, but think he's pretty
good at what he's doing, and simply wants to earn some extra cash. Second,
we need assignments. Most of those would probably crop up locally (local
TV stations, scenes, small companies, maybe even as muzak at local shops).
For this we need pepole all over the world, locating those assignments. If
we get those things, we´ll have a thing going here.
Of course, DiSC, which is a totally non-commersial organisation, itself
will not make any profit on this (except that the members may do jobs too
of course :), and any job is a buissness between the fellow doing it and
the one with the payroll. All we'll do is provide a website. If all this
actually is a realistic idea, that is. :) And if not, DiSC will continue
as just another tracker music group. Nothing wrong with that either...
Please mail all feedback and replys to me at: disc@audiophile.com
And, while you're at it, have a nice day.
/Tol the DiSCophile.
(c)
- DiSC 1997 - SOSU 1997 - Tol 1997 -
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